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Japan constructs first wood satellite, possible launch in September
- petermcneeley 2y ago"harnessing the environmental friendliness and low cost of wood in space development." The Poe's law is strong with this one!
- echoangle 2y agoI wonder what scale you have to produce satellites at for the raw material to be a price driver. Satellite development is very expensive, just the material of the structure is probably a rounding error compared to the total cost. How much would you save by using wood there? Even at Starlink scale, I would be surprised if it’s worth it.
- imtringued 2y agoA 2m x 1m sheet of aluminium costs something like $10 per kg and weighs 16kg. Not so sure about the weight to be fair.
- snakeyjake 2y agoTVAC testing that must have been a nightmare....
- RecycledEle 2y agoMy guess is that wood will splinter on impact in a way that metal does not. A flake of old paint in orbit will turn this cubesat into hundreds of satellite killing splinters. Those splinters will do untold damage to other satellites.